The Jumper Chronicles 2
by Benjamin Bradt
Summary: He gave his life to stop Vilgax, but fate had other plans. Jump into a new place filled with new problems, new villains, and new abilities. Dedicated to Traingham, the greatest Negima fanfic writer ever.
1. A Beginning's Near End

"Ben!" The Tennysons cried the name in unison as the red crystal shattered, spraying the red-haired teenager and the Chimera Sui Generis with bullet-like shards that shredded their garments, opening wounds on their flesh that wept creeping mist. Gwen sucked in a breath at the expression her friend made as the crystal tore his body; grimacing horribly at the instant of contact, the look of pain passed in seconds, replaced by a sort of sad serenity.

"No! I will not be denied my revenge!" Vilgax roared in impotent rage as his form began to disintegrate, the green and black of his body melting away into a dense white fog that was slowly spreading throughout the facility. Hex and The Forever King abandoned their posts by the machine, red lightning erupting around them as conduits began to melt and fuse together. The lights flickered out, leaving the room aglow from the mist itself, which emanated a soft white light.

"What's going on, what's happening to you?" Gwen reached out to touch Benjamin, but her fingers passed through his body, causing the part she touched to drift away from the rest of his slowly dissolving form, joining with the mist around them.

"I'm dying again . . . I guess." He smiled softly, "It feels like before, when I was lying in the hallway . . . I feel like I'm slipping away."

Gwen's eyes started to well with tears, "You can't die!"

"Just hold on man!" Ben began to twist the Omnitrix's dial rapidly, "Maybe as Upgrade I can fix the device, or as Ben-Viktor I can power it back up." The dial glowed red, ignoring his commands, and he struck the watch furiously. "Darn it, it's not working!"

"It's okay Ben." The teenager smiled, his face tired. "If you turn it on, Vilgax might come back, and as long as it's running, he can't be destroyed. We all know that."

"But still . . ." Ben's lip quivered, "It can't end like this."

Benjamin laughed and reached out to ruffle Ben's hair, but his hand dissolved into mist as he touched the younger boy. "It was over a long time ago Ben, I was just pretending that it hadn't ended. But I know now, that my time has already passed . . ."

"No!" Gwen pulled out her spell book, furiously flipping pages. "Somewhere in here there has to be a spell to stop this! Or maybe in the Archamada!"

Max laid a hand on his grand daughter's shoulder, "No Gwen, if Hex and Driscoll have taught us anything today, it's that we shouldn't meddle with things we don't fully understand." Max looked sadly at the teenager, "No matter how much it hurts us."

"Forget that!" Gwen smacked her grandfather's hand away, "They brought Ben here in the first place, it's too late to worry about meddling. We owe it to him to not let it end this way!" She began sifting through the rubble, as did her cousin.

"Gwen."

Benjamin called to her, but she ignored him, digging through the semi-collapsed structure. "Hex was here when the roof fell; maybe he dropped it over here somewhere!"

"Gwen!"

"Hurry up you stupid watch!" Ben continued to dig, "If only I could go Four Arms!"

Benjamin moved toward the two younger Tennysons, drawing the mist into himself, his face contorted in pain. He kneeled down, laying a hand on the red-haired girl's shoulder, "Gwendolyn, look at me."

She spun in surprise, finding him right behind her, his hand on her head as he brushed her hair back. "Ben, I don't want you to go!"

"I don't want to go either," he smiled, wiping her tears away, "But I have to."

Gwen sobbed loudly and threw her arms around him, weeping into his shoulder. "It's not fair! You can't go!"

Benjamin smiled and offered his other arm out to Ben, "A hug or a hand shake, Ben."

The brown-haired hero walked up and shook his friend's hand, then went in and hugged him. "Hand shakes are for friends, you're family."

The two of them couldn't see, but Benjamin blinked back tears as he hugged them fiercely. "Thank you Ben, that's the biggest compliment I've ever been paid." The two of them released him, Gwen reluctantly, and he smiled sadly. "I'm going to miss you, all of you. Ben, you're a good man, take care of your granddad for me. And you, Gwen," he smiled and kissed her cheek, "You're going to dazzle the world with your brilliance, someday."

"I promise I'll find a way to bring you back." Gwen wiped a tear away, "I'll dig up every book, every spell, whatever it takes. I swear it."

Ben smiled at her, "Gwen, if you spend your life fixed on one passing moment, you'll miss out on so many wondrous things." She stared at him, but he continued. "I will remember you always, as the brilliant girl who made me feel dumb by comparison, and I know that someday you'll meet and fall in love with someone who is just as brilliant as you." He winked, "Besides, we'll always have San Francisco."

Max smiled, "It's been a real pleasure to meet you, son."

"For me too." Benjamin shook his hand, "You watch your back, Max, I'd be awfully angry if you showed up prematurely."

And he was gone; Max's hand closed around intangible mist that slowly sank to the ground, every trace of the strange teenager lost forever. Max hugged his grandchildren close, smiling fondly. "Goodbye Mister Bradt, we'll miss you."

* * *

Drifting in the mist, Ben waited patently for the end. Would he disintegrate like before, slowly feel his every memory stripped from him, until he was nothing? "A shame to go out that way," he said to the void, "I've made so many wonderful friends; I'd hate to forget them all."

He felt ground beneath his feet, hard and smooth, cobblestones. The mist began to thin, and as it peeled away, he saw the glorious ocean. Miles of blue water stretched before him, and from his vantage point on the stone bridge, the sky seemed to go on into eternity. The radiant sun shined bright in the sky, and the breeze was cool on his face; even the air itself seemed pure and full of energy. "Heh . . ." he slipped his hands into his pockets, staring out at the boundless paradise, "This must be heaven . . ."

"100 light arrows . . . Sagitta Magica!"

Ben whirled at the shout, his eyes widening at the sight of many glowing missiles streaking towards him. "Oh my God!"

"100 ice arrows . . . Lilac Spiritus!"

As he turned to run, he found a similar hail of frozen missiles flying towards him, completely flanking him. "No no no no NO!" He threw his arms up, activating his Barrier program. The missiles hammered the surface relentlessly, sending deep cracks through the surface. "NOOOOO!" The bubble imploded, and Ben took the brunt of the remaining blasts, screaming wordlessly as he was catapulted into the air. The blasts sent waves of agony through his body as his clothes began to crumble; reduced to shabby rags as he plummeted back down to earth, hitting the stone bridge with a dull thud. He lay still, smoldering, his vision blurring.

**SYSTEMS REDUCED TO 15% AND FALLING . . . **

**SHUTDOWN IMMINENT . . .**

**SYSTEMS OFFLINE IN 5 . . .**

**4 . . .**

Ben wanted to scream, but his body wouldn't respond. Already he could feel himself fading. "This is . . . This is you're an- . . . Answer t- . . . To my plea . . ."

**3 . . .**

"It wasn't . . . -nuff t- . . . To erase me . . . You . . ."

**2 . . .**

"You had t . . . To blow me . . . Up . . ."

**1 . . .**

**SYSTEMS OFFLINE  
**

Ben convulsed as his body began to shut down, numbness spreading through his limbs. "I . . . hate you . . . God . . . you . . . son of . . . of a . . . bi- . . ." His eyes rolled back in his head, and everything went black.


	2. New Town, Faces, and Powers

" . . . od . . . not resp . . ." Voices began to fade in and out of Ben's mind; the speaker was young, with a heavy British accent. "I thi . . . illed . . . m a mon . . . r . . ."

"Stop y. . . ining . . . boya!" The second voice was feminine and had an accent, middle European; from the brusque authority in her voice she was experienced and well learned, albeit not a people person. "Serv . . . ight I say . . . no busin . . . eing there t . . . ith . . ."

"This entire . . . versation . . . moot, his life si . . . are quickly . . . bilizing . . ." Although young, the speaker's voice denoted vast intelligence and culture. Although she spoke English, her words held a notable Japanese accent. "What inter . . . s me are the mechanical implants."

**SYSTEM ONLINE**

The mechanical systems suddenly kicked on, causing Ben to flinch violently, his eyes flying open. The people around him made surprised noises and jerked away, most notably a young boy of ten, who almost leapt out of his skin, crying out in alarm. The only one who did not react was a small girl with long blonde hair, who fixed on him with green eyes filled with unnatural intelligence. "Well, well, looks like you survived after all." She crossed her arms, a look of annoyance on her face, "Not many people would have lived through that, you should be proud of yourself." The tone of her voice held no concern or genuine praise, but rather a dry sarcasm. She shifted her stance and put her hands on her hips, the uniform skirt rustling as she moved.

Ben pressed his prosthetic hand against his face, the metal being icy cold compared to the fevered sweat on his face. "Where am I?" As he moved to stand, his body was sluggish and unresponsive, every action filled with burning pain. He settled for a sitting position after the light blanket fell off his chest, expressing his state of undress. He quickly brought it halfway up his chest, plagued by a sudden burst of self-consciousness. "System status?"

**BASE SYSTEMS AT 35 PERCENT**

**WEAPONS OFFLINE**

**COMMUNICATIONS OFFLINE**

**LIFE SUPPORT AT 20 PERCENT**

"I have communications?" Ben crooked an eyebrow, "That's news to me."

"Yeah! According to your bios internal diagnostic specs, you have cellular/satellite adaptive communications capabilities." Ben's eyes drifted to the speaker, a black-haired girl in a maroon-themed school uniform and lab coat, her inquisitive eyes sparkling from behind thick-lenses. "What really interests me is your weapons systems; I can't access them while the routines are off-line, but I'd really like to ask you-"

Ben reached down and unplugged himself from the computer, the cable recoiling into the hourglass emblem on his wrist, the panel snapping closed. "Okay, hold on a second, dammit!" He squinted at the lab technician, "I have no idea what's going on right now, or where I am; so before we go back to treating me like a sports car in an auto shop, can someone please answer some questions for me?"

"You're in Japan, at the Mahora Academy Science Labs." The blonde girl spoke quietly in the voice of a young baroness. "After you appeared in the middle of my home and got yourself summarily blown up, we deliberated on whether or not to take you to the nurse's station, but upon seeing all the machinery, we thought you were one of Hakase's robots, and brought you here." She turned away, "Rather than bark at her for plugging you into that computer, you should be thanking her, she probably saved your life."

"Evangeline, be fair." The young boy spoke up, his proper British accent sounding out of character on such a young boy, "To have gotten so summarily blasted apart without warning must have been a shock, so I can imagine why he might be somewhat irritable regarding it." The boy placed a hand on his chest, "I am so sorry for what happened, it was my fault; when you appeared in the middle of the Master and I training, I froze, rather than redirecting the attack."

"That was training?" Ben chuckled wearily, "I thought I'd walked into the middle of a warzone. What kind of training involves-" The teenager groaned and pressed his hand to his forehead, "Gha . . . my head's killing me, I hope this isn't like last time."

The boy's face twisted with concern, "Of course, we haven't tended to your physical injuries yet." He turned to someone Ben could not see, "Chachamaru, would you please bring Konoka here?"

"Of course, Negi."

Ben squinted at the boy, "Look, I'm sure this isn't anything serious. Considering how things have been . . . lately, this is kind of normal for me." He extended his normal hand, "Benjamin Bradt."

"Negi Springfield." The boy smiled and shook the offered hand, "I teach homeroom here at Mahora."

Ben's eyes widened, "You . . . teach?" The boy was wearing a pastel green suit and red tie, his pale red hair tied back in a short ponytail; a set of pince nez glasses sat on his nose, the antiquated spectacles somehow fitting the odd ensemble of the little professor.

"Yes, I'm a collegiate English professor with a doctorate in Literature and The Arts." Negi grinned sheepishly, "I know it's hard to believe, but I really am a teacher."

"You know what . . ." Ben chuckled weakly, "Considering what I was doing yesterday, it's not so strange, I think." Ben groaned again, "Oh damn . . . this is a bad one." His eyesight blurred, then began to sharpen up, until everything was in crystal clarity. "What the hell? I can see."

"Could you not before?"

"Not without my glasses," Ben blinked and straightened up, the headache gone. "I used to be blind without them."

"Let me see!" The girl, Hakase, stepped between Negi and Ben, examining his eye with a hand-held phoropter. "I can see the optic filaments that you use to control your drop-down menus . . ."

Ben frowned, uncomfortable with her knowledge of his systems. "You know, that you apparently know more about what's wrong with me than I do, is kind of unsettling. I'm sorry, who are you?"

"Satomi Hakase, head of the Junior High division of the Mahora Robotics Club."

"Your school has a robotics club?"

"Stop looking around!" Hakase clucked her tongue thoughtfully, "It would appear that nano-filaments have integrated with your ocular nerves, probably augmenting the input signals to compensate for your visual deficiency." She grinned, "How amazing! Advanced technology integrated on a biological level. Together, you and I are going to revolutionize the current technological standard. Now let's see what other systems you have." Hakase grabbed a handful of the blanket and jerked it off of the teenager.

Ben yelped and grabbed the cloth, pulling it back over himself. "Hold on a second there! I'm naked!"

"Modesty is an antiquated concept. In science there is no need for modesty, I've seen plenty of pictures."

"Then go look at pictures!" Ben struggled to retain any level of privacy, "I'm not comfortable being naked in front of a girl!"

"Stop overreacting, this is purely professional." An extra set of mechanical arms extended from the device on the scientist's back, grabbing the blanket.

"Believe it or not, that kind of makes it worse!"

Negi grabbed the blanket, trying to help Ben, "Hakase, this is inappropriate behavior!"

"Are you guys playing strip tug-o-war?" The trio froze, glancing toward the door. Several girls stood in the now open doorway, many of them blushing at the scene of their professor and an apparently naked teenage boy fighting over a sheet, clutched in their classmate's hands. "If Negi's playing, I wanna play on Hakase's team!"

"This isn't what it looks like!" All three of them threw their hands up in defense; without anyone holding it up, the white blanket fell to the floor, causing pandemonium to erupt as the girls screamed and covered their faces, blushing furiously. Ben yelped and wrestled for the discarded blanket, with Negi trying to keep himself between the naked teenager and the active cameras held by both the scientist and the school's paparazzi.

* * *

"This is so friggin' embarrassing." Red-faced, Ben grumbled in irritation as he donned the clothes that Negi had provided him with; being tailored for his older self, the clothes were a close fit, although Ben was broader in frame than the young teacher's adult form.

Negi rubbed the back of his head, chagrinned. "I cannot begin to apologize for Hakase. She's a good-hearted girl, but when it comes to science she tends to lose perspective."

"It's fine," Ben's voice was grim as he belted the slacks on, thankful to be dressed again; the many scars on his body haunted him, made him feel like even more of a freak. He could only hope that no one had been paying very close attention. "Just what I need, more girls to think I'm a freak, because Dentech just wasn't enough of a blow to my self image."

"I've been meaning to ask you." Negi sat in a nearby chair, still keeping his back to Ben, respecting the boy's apparent discomfort with being seen naked. "How exactly is it that you appeared in the training resort like that? It's sealed to prevent intrusion by most."

"Not entirely sure," Ben sighed deeply, "I'm not entirely sure about anything these days." He walked past Negi and got himself a cup of water from the sink, "Does everyone here use magic?"

The young teacher paled, "MAGIC? Who said anything about magic?"

"Before I got caught in the crossfire, I heard you chanting in Latin, specifically the words 'Saggita Magica'. Being bombarded by a ton of energy and ice missiles after hearing someone shout 'magic arrows' is somewhat of a dead giveaway." Ben frowned as he buttoned up the shirt, realizing that the sleeves would not cover his arms effectively, being longer than the fifteen year old Negi.

"Oh no!" Negi panicked, waving his arms. "You can't know about that! I'll lose my license and be turned into an ermine!" Ben started laughing, which only seemed to agitate the young teacher further. "What are you laughing about? I could spend the rest of my life as a furry little creature! I'll lose my teaching job! This is no laughing matter!"

Ben grabbed Negi by the shoulders and shook him. "Relax, Professor Springfield! I appeared out of nowhere on your magical resort, my arm and leg are composed of living metal. I'm not exactly normal."

Negi breathed a sigh of relief, "When you put it like that, it doesn't sound so bad."

He chuckled, "Besides, you're not the first mage I've met. I know an eleven-year-old in California who can do some amazing things."

Negi grinned, "She's only a year older than I, that's impressive. Although," the young magi's smile dipped, "If she's not careful, letting someone like you see that she has magic could get her license revoked."

"She doesn't have one," Ben cursed as a button slipped out of his smooth metal fingers, "She's self taught, from a spell book she took from a mage who was high on a 'World Domination' kick."

"Here, let me get that for you."

Ben froze as Hakase appeared before him, her narrow fingers deftly buttoning up the shirt that Ben had been struggling with moments before. "Thank . . . you?"

"Hakase!" Negi waved his arms in confusion, "I sent everyone out, how did you get in here?"

"Stealth jacket," she tapped the plasticized white hoodie she was wearing, "The same ones Chao and I used to avoid Gandolfini during the festival." She turned back to Ben, winking. "Excitable, isn't he?"

Ben nodded stiffly, a deep crimson blush spreading across his face at the proximity of the young scientist. "Uhh . . . yeah . . ."

"Anyway, I came to apologize."" Having finished buttoning the shirt, Satomi stepped back and bowed apologetically, "I tend to get carried away when the scientist in me gets excited, and this isn't the first time I've crossed a few social borders without realizing it."

Ben forced a smile onto his face as he bowed, "It is I who should apologize." Both teacher and student widened their eyes in surprise as he spoke to them in Japanese, his voice stammering slightly as he struggled to remember the proper inflections and words. "By nature, I am not a social beast, and I often forget that a guest should treat others in a respectful way without condition. You saved my life, Miss Hakase, and I am in you debt."

It was Hakase's turn to blush, ". . . thank you, Mister Bradt."

"Please, Hakase, call me Ben."

"Okay, but . . . only if you call me Satomi." The two fell into an awkward silence, broken a few minutes later when Negi cleared his throat. "Well, I'm pleased to see you two have made up." The pair chuckled quietly, turning their attention toward the ten-year-old. "I think that we ought to be on our way; Ben, we need to find you some manner of lodging, while we figure out the nature of your arrival"

"O-of course!" Hakase bowed to her teacher, "Sensei, if the Mahora Robotics Club may be of any assistance, do not hesitate to call upon us."

"Thank you Hakase." Negi bowed to her, "Ben, let's go meet with Dean Konoe."

"Lead on, Professor." Ben smiled to the scientist, gently laying his metal hand on her arm before turning to go. "I'll see you around campus later, Satomi."

"Alright . . . Ben . . ." She smiled as he walked away, absently rubbing her arm were he'd touched her moments before.


	3. A Chase through the City

The air within the dean's expansive office seemed stale, the books that lined the walls almost imposing in the way that they seemed to be what held the ceiling up. The huge window behind the aged school master granted him a beautiful view of a towering tree that seemed to connect the ground below to the cloudy sky above, surrounded by beautiful water and a dazzling cityscape. In another time, he would have stood before the glass portal and marveled at the awe-inspiring view of Mahora Academy as any newcomer would, but now he could only stare pensively at the wrinkled man before both him and the diminutive English Professor who had spent the better part of an hour explaining the events that transpired upon Ben's arrival within Evangeline's resort.

Dean Konoe sat expressionless on the other side of the large desk, stroking his white beard absently as he listened intently, his black eyes gleaming in the light. The heavy scrutiny he seemed to project made every second seem to crawl, which made the uncomfortable teenager all the more aware of how ill-fitting the clothes that Negi had provided really were. He shifted his shoulder as he sighed, uncomfortable with the protracted silence, and as he stretched the artificial limb he was rewarded with the sharp hiss of tearing fabric as the narrow-shouldered garment tore. "Shit!" Ben's quiet profanity seemed to explode in the silence, rewarding him with both Negi and the dean's full attention. Immediately blushing a deep red, Ben bowed his head. ". . . sorry . . ."

Konoe cleared his throat, "All things considered you should count yourself most fortunate to have survived. Most who find themselves on the receiving end of Dark Evangel's magic seldom live to tell the tale. Young professor Springfield is no slouch either." Negi chuckled and rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "For now, until we get to the bottom of your arrival here, I suppose it'd be only fair to make some sort of living accommodation for you."

"I appreciate the offer, Dean Konoe," Ben bowed respectfully, "But I really don't feel comfortable taking advantage of your hospitality."

"No, please," Negi laid a hand on Ben's arm, "It really is no trouble."

"Thank you for your hospitality, however, I cannot accept," Ben shook his head, "There are fifteen hotels in Academy City, any one of which I can get a room at, all within walking distance of the train station. I'll go requisition quarters like any normal visitor." Before either of them could say anything, the teenager had already turned and started for the door, leaving the office at a quick clip.

Negi and Konoe shared a glance as he left, the door closing lightly behind him. "Keep an eye on him, Negi," the elderly man said in a quiet, matter-of-fact tone, "Things happen for a reason."

Gathered outside the building, several of Negi's students waited for the teacher and the mysterious visitor to emerge from Dean Konoe's office; some had been present when he appeared within the confines of the resort, others had arrived only to be turned away after Hakase had won the tug of war contest, or heard about it and come to see who the American teenager was. Asuna crossed her arms in annoyance, "I can't believe this! Some new boy shows up and everyone runs up here to gawk. I don't see what the big deal is."

"Yeah, I know, right?" Konoka smirked at her, "Atleast you didn't drop everything and run up here with them, huh?"

Chachamaru looked down at Satomi, who was absolutely bouncing on her heels, a myriad of scientific tools stuffed into the bag slung on her shoulder, "Are you sure it is wise to display your intent to analyze his mechanical components so openly, Hakase-dono? Your last encounter with him indicated that such concepts made him uncomfortable."

"Nonsense," the young scientist smiled eagerly as her eyes held on the door ahead of them all, "He understands how amazing he is. I'm sure he won't begrudge my curiosity."

"Kasumi," Sayo hovered invisibly off to her friend's side, "I don't think the professor would approve of you hounding the newcomer for photographs." She blushed, "I m-mean, you already s-s-saw him n-n-n-n-n-"

"Freedom of the press, Sayo," Asakura turned on the 'frame-by-frame' option on her digital camera. "He apparently appeared on Evangeline's mystic resort, and the pictures I got shows some interesting scars and some even more interesting metal body parts. I may not be able to snap any pictures of the magic users on campus, but there's no embargo on cyborg teenage boys."

As he approached the door out of the building, he spotted the swarm of girls on the other side. Most he did not recognize, but Satomi was obviously at the head, bag of instruments at hand. He also recognized the shutterbug, her digital in hand. "Dammit," Ben punched the wall lightly, "How the hell am I going to get out without getting hounded?"

"Ben, wait!" The teenager turned to see Professor Springfield walking down the hallway, "Please reconsider the offer for lodging!"

"Oh holy hell!" Ben grimaced, "System status?"

**BASE SYSTEMS AT 100%**

**WEAPONS SYSTEMS ONLINE**

**COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS ONLINE**

**LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS AT 100%**

Ben turned and pushed open the doors, emerging into the beaming sunlight. As the girls started toward him, he took a step forward. "Artea Steal, execute." Ben disappeared in a flash of red light, much to the shock of the girls, and the young professor who emerged from the door a second afterward.

"Where did he go?" The cry of surprise echoed through the group as they swept their eyes around, trying to figure out where the enigmatic teen had disappeared to.

"He was here just a second ago!"

"How did he do that?"

"Negi, is he a wizard too?"

Chachamaru's eyes became unfocussed as her sensors swept outward, "Negi, I am detecting a power fluctuation similar to the one which occurred when Bradt-san initially disappeared from our location twenty-six seconds ago. It is south of here, toward the city."

"I'm going after him," Negi imbued magic through his body, allowing his physical abilities to rise well beyond their normal levels, before dashing off through the school grounds.

"Chachamaru, pursuit mode," Satomi's command registered immediately in the gynoid, who turned and took off after Negi. "He's not getting away from me!" Satomi's backpack billowed flame as rockets ignited, propelling her skyward as a pair of wings unfurled from the device strapped to her back.

"So, it's a game of catch the canary!" Konoka thrust a fist skyward, "I will be the one to win!"

She loped off after the others, followed by a frantic Setsuna. "Ojou-sama, you must stop these ridiculous games!"

Kaede shifted her glance toward Mana, allowing a smirk to pass across her expression as she opened an eye. "The usual stakes?"

The imperceptible nod had barely left the dark-skinned huntress before she was off, racing toward the city.

"Yay, it's a hunting game!" The twins high-fived, "A chance to show off our skills," they turned back to their master, but found only a small stick in the dirt, a crudely-drawn stick figure of their master on the attached paper card. "Oh! No fair! We're coming too!"

The rest of the students departed after their professor, save Asuna, who remained behind alongside Kotaro. She sighed in frustration, "I swear, this is so dumb!"

"I know right?" Kotaro stuffed his hands in his pockets, "I don't know why everyone's getting all up in arms over some weirdo American."

"It's not even that," Asuna crossed her arms, "It's about needing to prove to Negi that they're good enough; yeah, Negi is chasing after that weird kid, but no one else needs to. Just because Kaede went after him, you're not trying to prove how cool you are by trying to outrace her."

"Y-yeah," Kotaro shifted on his feet, "Why would I need to prove to Kaede that I'm cool, right?" Kotaro smiled nervously, itching at his temple, before breaking off in a frenzied run after the others.

Stunned, Kotaro was almost out of sight before Asuna shouted after him, "Oh come _ON_ now!"

Thankful that his prosthetics allowed him a decreased amount of exertion to perform actions, Ben was making full use of the head start he had gotten on the others. As the day was fading into the evening, the mostly uncrowded streets of the academy city made for easy travel, allowing him to sprint unimpeded. Unfortunately, it also made him easy to spot, a fact that did not escape his notice as a pair of jet-propelled students shot past him. He skidded to a halt as Satomi and Chachamaru landed ahead of him, Negi coming up from behind. "Ben, please," the diminutive teacher stepped toward him, "I don't understand why you're running away. We haven't done anything."

"No, you haven't," Ben sighed, "And I don't want you to. I don't want your kindness, I don't want your charity; I'm here for a reason and I don't want the rest of you embroiled in it."

"What is the reason you're here, then?" Satomi stepped forward, "Maybe we can help you."

"I don't know, and I don't want help." Ben wouldn't meet her gaze, "You don't understand what's going on."

"Then help us understand." Negi glanced over his shoulder as the other students came into view, "We are all willing to help you in any way."

"I don't want your help!" Ben bolted down an adjacent alleyway, disappearing in a burst of light and appearing on a rooftop a few seconds later. Stamping her foot, Satomi shot after him, followed close behind by Chachamaru.

"Wait, don't chase after him!" Negi shouted after the scientist and her gynoid companion, but his words went unheeded. As the other students passed him in their game of pursuit, the teacher face-palmed, "Oh crumb, this is getting out of hand."

As Ben fled across the rooftops, he became aware of a figure pacing him, her form dark against the amber sky as she sped along an adjacent rooftop. As he leapt to the next one, she closed the gap, cutting him off so quickly he nearly tripped and fell on his face.

The woman before him smiled in a lazy, mercurial expression, her eyes mere slits on her olive face. "Now now, sir, my teacher would like you to reconsider his kindness."

Ben stared stupidly at the lithe girl before him, "Cripes your fast."

"Ninja's rely on their speed first and foremost."

_Christ, he's got ninjas too?_ Ben swore under his breath, glancing around at the other girls as they closed in, "Ninja, seriously? I thought you all wore uniforms with black face masks."

She opened one eye just a touch, "Sorry to disappoint you, but I left my pajamas back at my dorm. I wasn't expecting a rooftop chase today."

"How very jocular," Ben tried to run past her, but she was in front of him the moment he turned, as if she'd always been there. "Heh, not used to having a girl around who wants to be this close to me," he joked weakly, slowly backing away.

"Well perhaps it's because you're so quick to turn down people's kindness." She started to approach him as he retreated, matching his pace, "I don't see why else you wouldn't have girls around you, you're certainly cute enough."

Ben paled, then turned a furiously embarrassing shade of red; her comment caught him off guard, so much so that although he had been planning to walk backwards off the rooftop, as his foot plunged into oblivion and he pitched backwards over the side he yelped in shock. "Execute!"

Kaede leapt over the side, discovering too late that he was nowhere in sight. She easily caught herself and leapt back onto the rooftop, but her prey had eluded her.

One second he was plunging over the rooftop's edge, the next he was tumbling through a rack of hanging clothes and skidding across a clothing store floor, coming to a stop under an overturned display. Ben groaned and sucked in the breath he'd lost upon jarring impact with the floor, trying to detangle himself from the clothing, trying to ignore the annoyed glances from the approaching salesperson. As he rose to his feet, he caught a glimpse of some students running past the store front window and ducked behind another display, narrowly avoiding the keen eyes of Mana as she scanned the area before quickly moving along.

The sales girl sighed and jabbed a finger into one of the tears on the shirt he was wearing, "You're going to have to pay for that, you know!"

Annoyed, he pulled his wallet out and handed her the first credit card he found, "Here, and while you're at it; get me a pair of size eleven black boots, steel-toe, a white shirt with a mandarin-style collar, size one x, and some black dress pants, waist thirty-eight."

Her eyes widened as the platinum card slipped into her fingers, "Right away sir!"


	4. Breaking the Pattern

As the sun sank behind the distant horizon, the girls combed the streets of the academy city, seeking any sign of the American. Negi sighed deeply as he watched them rush about, determined to locate the man who had escaped their earlier efforts to catch him. "I don't understand . . ."

"Don't worry, Negi-sensei," Haruna patted his shoulder reassuringly, "We'll find him. Once the people close down, I'll whip up some golems using Imperium Graphices and we'll turn everything inside out."

"No, this has gone too far." Negi whistled for the girls' attention, "Everyone, we're done here. Let's go."

Sounds of surprise and confusion emerged from the group as they turned their eyes to the child teacher as he was walking back to the dorms, head bowed in defeat. Nodoka was the first to run after him, "But Professor Negi, I thought you wanted us to find him."

"No, Nodoka," Negi smiled sadly at her, "I wanted to help him; an American in Japan, that's the closest I've come in a long time to meeting anyone English. Seeing him so out of place, I sympathized with his discomfort and wanted to give him the help I was given when I first arrived. But, I guess . . ." he shrugged and started walking again, "I guess some people just don't want to be helped."

Following the example of their teacher, the girls left the city and their quarry to be, returning to the dorms.

Watching their departure, Ben sighed and bowed his head guiltily, staring intently at his gloved hand as he fitted its mate over his prosthetic. "I'm sorry, professor," Ben spoke quietly to no one as he watched them leave, "But if this is anything like last time, there is going to be a fight against some kind of all-powerful asshole, and I'd rather not get anyone else involved."

"Here you go, sir!" The salesperson, grown infinitely cheerier since Ben had begun spending copious amounts of money at her store, approached him with a dark blue suit coat. "I had to call around to other stores, but we found one."

"Excellent." He slipped the jacket on, feeling it rest nicely across his broad shoulders as the sleeves slipped down, covering half of the gloves. "I'll take the bag of other things as well," he indicated a small duffel on the counter, loaded with undergarments and cotton sleep wear.

"Will there be anything else, sir?"

"No, thank you." Taking his card, Ben shouldered the bag and left, walking toward the train station. "Navigator, GPS map from present location to motels adjacent to Mahora Academy train station." The transparent map that appeared before his eyes made the trip easy, and before long, he was setting his bag down in a motel room. Stuffing a few bills into the bellhop's hand, Ben closed the door and sat on the bed, burying his face in his hands, "Oh my God."

He sat like that for hours, he wasn't sure how many. Dentech seemed so long ago, then San Francisco, now Mahora. It seemed like there was more, even; at the fringes of his memory he saw glimpses of places he almost recognized, faces that seemed familiar, but not. "What if this isn't as simple as it seems," he mumbled into his hands, "Have I been to even more places than this? How long has this been going on?"

"Interesting," a strange voice spoke to him, "You are not like then other humans." Ben groaned and peeked between his fingers at the speaker, a blond boy standing by the room door. "You are flesh and bone, but metal and energy," he closed the door with a gentle click, "You radiate power unlike anything I have known. Who are you?"

"Who are you?" Ben countered, irritated, "Most people would show the consideration to knock before entering into a room, especially a locked one." He lowered his hands, sighing deeply, "Look kid, I just want to go to sleep, so could you please get the hell out of my room?"

"I watched you flee from the mage earlier, him and his legion of girl followers." The boy walked forward, "We have a common enemy, and with your help, I can destroy him."

"Destroy who? Negi?" Ben stopped to examine the boy standing before him. He looked barely six, with copper eyes that shined without the aid of the light, as if something lurked within him. The way he smiled, his mouth always moving somewhat, made him look unbalanced; dangerous, even insane. "Springfield is a decent kid, what's your beef with him?"

"Decent?" The grin was gone, replaced with a malicious snarl of an expression. "His very existence is to spit in the eye of he who created us! He stands in the way of our creator's designs time and again, meddling, always meddling!"

"Who the hell are you kid?" Ben stood up, nearly twice the boy's height, "You want to talk about not normal? That's you kid, with a big, fat exclamation mark at the end. Now, tell me who the hell you are, and what the hell you're doing here."

"You would stand between me and my goals?" The comment seemed to abate the fury, returning a sliver of mirth to his expression.

"I get the feeling that you're the reason I'm here, kid, so let's cut the crap. Springfield is my friend, and if you're going to get all 'Johnny the Homicidal Maniac' on him, you better be ready for a smack down.

"I am not this Johnny of whom you speak," the boy lifted a hand, "I am Septimus." Was it Ben's imagination, or was the room getting brighter? "If you are his ally, then I will make an EXAMPLE of you!"

"Oh s-" Before he could even finish the phrase, a great deluge of lightning erupted from the boy, washing over Ben in a cascade of destructive fury. The wall gave way as he was pushed through it, falling two stories to be dashed on the cobblestone streets below. The rest of the wall gave way shortly after, dropping wood and plaster debris onto the crumpled form of Benjamin Bradt, burying him under the ruins of the room he had rented hours before.

The flash of golden light lit the night sky for miles, the explosive boom echoing across the sleeping city. But most notably, the boy's laughter was a keening expression of pure madness that reached the ears of a sleeping English professor, startling him out of a sound sleep.

"Mmmph . . . what?" Negi awkwardly detangled himself from the protective embrace of his sleeping roommate, climbing out of the room's bunk bed and retrieving his glasses from the nearby desk. As he placed them upon the bridge of his nose, he immediately noticed the great golden luminance that seemed to erupt from the city, as if the sun were rising from within its street way corridors. "What the devil is that?"

Sensing the magic, Negi slipped his bathrobe on and grabbed his staff, launching himself into the night sky through the bedroom window. As he approached the radiant dome, he felt the light pass over his skin, and as he entered the globe he saw the world seem to change. The flawless street seemed to fade away, revealing a pile of rubble, cast down from the blown out face of the adjacent hotel. "Oh my God, who did this?"

"Hello Professor Negi!" The jovial cry came from a nearby rooftop, and as Negi looked up, a blond boy hurled himself from the building's edge. "_Septimus, septimus, septimus. Locos Umbrae Regnans Scáthach! In Manum Meum Dedo Iaculum Daemonium Cum Spinis Triginta! Iaculatio Fulgoris!_"

Recognizing the spell, Negi swerved to avoid the massive landfall of lightning as it rained down, turning the street into a shattered mass of gravel. The young professor moved to stand on the exposed ledge, bringing his staff to his hand, "Who are you? Why are you attacking me?"

Septimus landed lightly on the ruined ground, turning his face up to make eye contact with Negi. "I am Septimus, sent to destroy Negi Springfield."

"Why?" Negi balked at the bluntness of the statement, "I've not done anything wrong to you."

"Not to me, to my maker, and those he has made." He smiled and gestured toward the pile of rubble. "Already, one of you lies dead, a fool who stood between us. He thought to make himself a shield."

The rubble shifted, and slowly, painfully, Ben dragged himself out of it. The clothes he had bought were reduced to rags, and periodically, sparks burst forth from the ragged gashes on the exposed surfaces of his prosthetics. "You sick little puppy, how many people did you kill? How many others were in the motel?"

"It matters not." Septimus withdrew a pactio card from his pocket, "My artifact, Somnii ex Tellustris, can be used to create pocket dimensions; copies of small areas where the destruction is contained, and when dispelled, no harm is done to the actual place. It makes killing you so much more pleasant."

"I will not let you endanger others." Negi stepped down from the edge, landing lightly on the street, "Face me now, and let him go."

"Get stuffed, Springfield," Ben staggered to his feet, the blood running down his face and chest dissolving into mist and fading away. "This little bitch is begging for a fight."

"You both seem mistaken, thinking you are in control here." Septimus turned the car over in his hand, causing the world around them to shift; the rubble shot into the sky. "This allows me to bend the world to my will; the moment you step in, the moment you are doomed, one in the same."

"Crush cannon, fire!" The orb of light swelled in Ben's hand, and he let fly. It streaked across the open field, striking Septimus' hand and exploding in a burst of golden light. The world around them shattered like glass, falling away to reveal the street at night, untouched. The new suit, destroyed in the initial attack, seemed undamaged as well, much to the wearer's delight.

"No!" Septimus howled in fury as the pactio card erupted into flames, crumbling away to nothingness in his hand. The damage, caused by the explosion to his own body, seemed to go unnoticed. "Monster! Bastard! You destroy the precious thing my maker has given me!"

Another sphere of light swelled up in Ben's hand, "I'm only getting started, you little worm. I'm going to enjoy tearing you apart."

"No, this can't happen here!" Negi ran over to Ben, "You can't fight him here. The people could be hurt, or worse, learn the truth about magic."

The American's gaze flickered between the homicidal boy and Negi; he was right, the longer they dealt with this Septimus, the greater risk of others being hurt. But then again, the little dick had blasted him through a brick wall, dropped him two stories, and buried him under a lot of debris. After a few terse seconds, the American let out a long sigh. "You're right," Ben allowed the blast to taper off, "Get out of here, Septimus, walk away and save yourself the embarrassment of getting beaten."

The light around Septimus began to intensify, "You dare to mock me? I will annihilate you all!" He extended a hand forward, "_Septimus, septimus, septimus. Vigo repecampte ardulo-_"

Negi grabbed the boy by the wrist, "_Ras tel Ma Scir Magister, __Unam Fila Nigra Promissiva, Limitationem per Decanum Dies!_" The light immediately dimmed away as a flare of dark shadow seemed to envelop Septimus' wrist for a moment and as Negi moved his hand away, beneath where the teacher had held him seconds before, a black ring encircled the strange boy's arm.

"You can't do that! That's a self binding spell only!" Septimus tried again to summon up the magical energy, but it would not obey.

"I changed it to bind you." Negi smiled, "Now you can't use that magic to threaten anyone." Negi walked back toward Ben, "Come on, let's go chat. This is done."

Septimus howled in fury and sprang on Negi, trying to strangle him, "You bastard, you monster! I'll kill you for this!" Surprised, Negi grappled with his assailant, trying to get a breath of air.

Ben grabbed Septimus by the collar and tossed him off of Negi, sending his small form rolling across the cobblestones. "He's letting you walk away you little shit, take the opportunity." Septimus' only reply was another ragged howl as he charged; Ben swung his prosthetic with intent, the heavy metal limb hitting Septimus with the solid thud of a hammer striking a melon. The boy reeled backwards and hit the street hard, blood running down his face from his broken nose; he was unconscious, dead to the world.

Negi rose to his feet, "I hope you didn't hurt him too badly."

Ben scoffed, "He just tried to kill us, Springfield, and I should be returning the favor."

"And I appreciate that you're not." Negi grabbed Ben's sleeve. "There's an all-night coffee shop around the corner, let's go get a cup and talk."

Much as it had been earlier, with Ben standing mutely by as Negi poured over his exposition, it was Negi's turn to listen as Ben laid his own story out before the youthful English professor: New York, the bombing, Boushi, Dentech City, Dante Menjari, Meiru, dying, The Tennysons, Vilgax, dying again, even the dreams. The story flowed out of him as if a great dam had broken, and by the end of it, Negi looked almost green. "Wow . . . that's quite a lot to digest."

"I still have a hard time believing it's all happened," Ben said quietly as he stared into his cup of coffee, "Sometimes, I think I just have to wake up, and it'll all be some strange dream."

"Would it be better for you if it was?" Negi sipped his tea, "It all sounds so harrowing. Wouldn't it be better to just be back in this . . . Dentech City?"

"You mean would it be better, going back to being a freak in love with a girl who barely knows he exists; back to living in big empty houses and at the bottom of pill bottles, waiting for my body to fall completely apart? Do I want to go back to wondering each day if I'm going to wake up in a hospital, confined to a bed or strapped into a machine because some asshole doctor took away the things that allow me to FAKE being normal?" Ben's voice was cracking, his hands shaking as he set the coffee down, "This life and the other aren't very different, honestly; one way or another I'm waiting to die, it's just that here, I'm not sitting by watching the girl I gave my life for run into someone else's arms." He pressed his face into one palm, struggling to stifle frustrated tears, "I just want a life, Professor; I want to go to school, I want to join an activity club, I want to fall in love with a girl who only sees me. I want to have a family, I want a . . . a home . . . I just . . . want things to make sense. I want to stop hurting!"

Negi looked down into his cup, allowing Ben to regain his composure. "Then why not stay here, at Mahora? You're certainly not a freak here; amidst the robot, ninjas, vampire, demons, and wizards, you're just another student."

"Live here . . ." Ben allowed his mind to wander. _Could it be so simple?_ _Attending high school in Mahora, a diminutive English professor, not being the weird kid, getting better acquainted with Satomi, battling Septimus . . ._

_Septimus._

"It doesn't matter," Ben sighed, "I'm here because Septimus is here, and as long as he's here, the result is inevitable."

"Septimus can't hurt anyone now," Negi urged Ben to think positively, "Don't count it out yet. You deserve a chance at the life you want, right?" He rose and grabbed Ben's arm, "Now come on, let's go get some rest in my dorm, and tomorrow we'll see ab0ut the rest of this ordeal. I'm sure my roommates won't mind."

"No, it's okay Negi." Ben smiled softly, "I already know where I can go."


	5. Losing One's Anonymity

As the lunch period bell rang, the students of Class 3-A set about their respective dining plans; several of them rose and left in a quick pace, eager to reach the cafeteria before their much sought after snack foods were sold out, while others went to dine outside in the warm summer sun. The library trio brought their meals along with them, taking up vantage at their desks so that Nodoka, and surreptitious Yue, could watch Professor Springfield eat with his roommates Asuna and Konoka, with Setsuna joining her Ojou-sama. Amidst the adoring stares of her classmates, Haruna could only roll her eyes and resume cell work on her latest manga project, knowing full well that nothing interesting would come of the lunch conversation.

Satomi was in the process of packing up her laptop, planning on going to the robotics lab to work during lunch, when Negi approached her. "Hakase, do you have a minute?"

"Of course, Sensei," the pretty scientist smiled and turned her attention to him, "What can I do for you?"

"Well, when Ben and I parted ways last night, he said he was going to talk to you about a place to stay." The young Englishman smiled warmly, "Did he manage to find you?"

"Oh yeah," Hakase nodded, "He slept in my dorm last night." She unintentionally flashed back to the night before and their early morning exchange, causing her to blush. "W-we're supposed to meet up after school."

"Good, I am glad to hear it." Negi smiled and returned to his friends, oblivious of Hakase's change in demeanor.

Haruna, however, could not have missed her classmate's response. As Hakase walked past her, she elbowed Yue and Nodoka. "Did you hear that? Negi's runaway American is sharing a room with Hakase." She grinned devilishly, "Didn't take her long to snatch up an eligible bachelor; it's good to see that someone around here has the initiative to after a man."

Nodoka blushed fiercely, hiding her face behind a text book. Yue covered her heated flush with a counter comment, "I'm sure it's nothing like that; just because he's sharing a dorm with her, doesn't mean she's doing that."

"If you're certain of that, there's one way to settle it." Haruna clenched a fist in determination, "Today, after school, we will follow Hakase and her American boy-toy and see what manner of shenanigans they're up to. If it's innocent, then it's no big deal; however, if they're doing the things that couples do, we will observe and learn." Paru's mind was ablaze with ideas as she cackled devilishly, "I think that observational experience of these sorts are essential to preparing Nodoka for her fateful encounter with Professor Springfield!"

There was a loud 'thunk', followed by surprised murmurs from the class members who heard it. The manga-ka's narrative had been too much for Nodoka's ever-active imagination, and the girl had driven herself into a crimson-faced, bloody-nosed swoon; the telltale 'thunk' had been the sound of the unconscious bookworm's head as it hit the wooden desk. The other two members of the library trio face-palmed with a heavy sigh.

* * *

Having spent the day wandering around Mahora's vast campus, Ben found himself standing within some kind of performance hall; the stage was host to an assortment of musical instruments, setup in preempt of an afterschool practice, most likely. The name 'Dekopon Rocket' was emblazoned across the instruments in the form of colorful stickers, buttons pinned onto cases, and a logo splashed across the face of the kick drum.

"Huh, must be a student band." Ben hopped up onto the stage and walked around the gathering of instruments; they were well used, showing the signs of devoted practice. "Maybe they'll play while I'm here, before . . ." He paused, resting his hand on the neck of a guitar, "But . . . what if it's different? Negi and I already dispensed with Septimus, the 'threat'. What if I'm not going to die and fade away, wind up somewhere else? What if I'm stuck here? I'm going to have to finish school, Hell, I don't even know how old I am anymore. I'm going to have to find a job. This place must have its own 'Benjamin Bradt'; do I contact his parents? What if he's dead? God, what if he's alive?"

As he moved his hand away, his fingertips brushed the strings, creating the faintest of musical sounds. He paused, head half-cocked as the sound faded away; the notes tugged at something within him, some buried memory.

_Night had settled over the forest, creating a serene balance between the soft wind and the sounds of the nighttime animals. The campfire crackled and popped loudly in the stillness, creating dancing shadows around their campsite's perimeter. Ben sighed wearily and looked down at the tears in his clothes; the enemy had been relentless, appearing in droves and always lashing out with halberds, driving the army back into the grasslands. He ached all over, wounds stinging as he moved cautiously, afraid to reopen the deeper ones. "I wish I could say the fight was going well."_

"_No fight goes well, per se." His companion, an elfin woman with pale green hair, smiled as she unslung a bouzouki from her back, "So long as the goal is to deprive someone of their life, how well can something truly go?" She strummed softly at the musical instrument, her painted nails dancing gracefully along the nigh invisible strings._

_Ben leaned back and stared up at the stars, listening to the music she played. "Nei, all my life seems to be about anymore is battling; another enemy, another death, waking up in another strange place."_

"_Sounds like you need a hobby." The musician smirked and patted the ground beside her, "Come sit with me, traveller, let me teach you the ways of the strings."_

Soundlessly, Ben picked up the guitar and sat down on the edge of the stage. The instrument felt heavy and familiar in his hands, and as he picked at the strings, each one created a clear note that sang out in the open air. As he sat and strummed at it, a soft click drew his attention, and as he looked down he found that the connection port on his wrist had opened and allowed the end of a ¼" patch cord to slip free.

**ENGAGING ACOUSTIC INTERFACE**

He plugged the guitar into his arm through the patch cable, and as he brought his fingers across the strings again, the music seemed to course through him; he could feel the notes as they vibrated through the instrument, travelling down the cable into his arm and emerging through the audio interface as a fluid, melodious sound. Ben sat and noodled with the strings for awhile, lost in a sort of euphoria, his body a conduit for the music. The sounds became more focused, blending together, until a clear pattern emerged from the random notes. As the music player in his arm came to life, the world outside of him faded away; he climbed to his feet, toes off the stage's lip, and felt the words leave his lips and hit the wall across from the stage:

"_Don't bury me, I'm not yet dead."_

The feeling of not caring was gratifying; he didn't know if anyone was around, and for the moment, he didn't care.

"_Don't bury me, I'm not yet dead."_

The music felt exhilarating; his voice was a peal of thunder in the stillness.

"_Don't bury me, I'm not yet dead;  
not a walking zombie with no head,  
not a Stepford wife made to obey;  
don't want to go through life that way._

I'm alive, I'm alive, that's what I say;  
I'm alive, I'm alive, gonna live that way.  
I'm alive, I'm alive, that's what I say;  
I'm alive and I'm gonna live today."

The other instruments crept into his ears as he played; the rest of the song was pouring out from him, swirling around the room. He imagined he was standing on the edge of a cliff, a storm roaring around him, the wind stirring his hair.

_"Do robots dream of electric sheep?  
I need to live my dreams, not just in my sleep.  
I've been holed up here, but it's time to leave; _

_I need to make my move while I've air to breathe.  
Don't give me drugs, no Novocain;  
I must be alive, 'cause I still feel pain.  
We were born with wings, we were made to fly;  
we were meant to live while we're still alive._

_I'm alive, I'm alive, that's what I say;  
I'm alive, I'm alive, gonna live that way.  
I'm alive, I'm alive, that's what I say;  
I'm alive and I'm gonna live today."_

The feeling of the slowly growing crescendo made his heart race; spending so much of his time turned inwardly, focusing on the depressing aspects of a life ending soon, this exhibitionist display of music was exhilarating. As he repeated the chorus a second time, Ben found himself stomping his heel on the stage in rhythm with the kick drum, mouth turned upward in a ridiculous grin.

Midway through the third repeat the class release bell rang, its melodic tone shattering his trance; the guitar stopped abruptly, the music from his media player sounding strangely discordant with the corresponding chords omitted, allowing him to karaoke along. _I better go, before the band people show up and get rightfully annoyed at the stranger playing around with their stuff. Probably a fairly dick move on my part,_ he thought to himself as he returned the instrument to its stand. He hopped off the stage and jogged out, closing the auditorium door behind him; at no point did he see the blonde girl hiding behind the stage curtain videotaping him with her cellphone, her eyes filled with stars.

* * *

**MOL Mahora On-Line Chat Session #433759**

**Neko_Shiina: ** OMG! U hav 2 c **this!**

_upload file- guitarhottie .mp4_

**Idol_Misa:** OMG!

**Neko_Shiina:** I know right?

**Kugi-sama:** O_O

Is that my guitar?

**Neko_Shiina:** Ya! I totally walked into the practice space and saw him playing it. Let

me tell you, the video does not do him justice!

**Nurse_Izumi: **He sounds really good!

**Kugi-sama:** Do we know who he is? Please tell me _someone_ has seen him around!

**Nurse_Izumi: **Nope.

**Idol_Misa:** I'd remember THAT one. ^_~

**Neko_Shiina: **Not a clue.

**Kugi-sama: **Someone get ahold of Kazumi, she knows everything about everyone

on campus.

**Idol_Misa: **Righty-o!

_Idol_Misa has set her status to "AFK – Calling the paparazzi"_

**Neko_Shiina: ** So yeah, total brain storm! He should totally play onstage with us at

the show in two weeks!

**Kugi-sama: **OMG! I was just thinking the same thing!

**Nurse_Izumi:** Yeah, but would he do it? I mean, you know, total stranger and all . . .

**Idol_Misa: **Alright, she said she'd be here in a sec!

_Idol_Misa has set her status to "Dekopon Rocket"_

_MahoraPress has joined the chat session_

**MahoraPress: **Alright girls, I'm here, what's up?

**Neko_Shiina: **OMG! Kazumi, do you know who **this boy** is? I totally caught him

jamming on stage with Madoka's guitar!

**MahoraPress: **. . . ?

. . . !

LOLZ! =D

**Kugi-sama:** Wha !

**Nurse_Izumi: **?

**Idol_Misa:** Kazumi?

**Neko_Shiina: **What's so funny?

**MahoraPress: **Haha! I didn't know he could play guitar! I should update his article.

http:/www. mahopedia .org/wiki/Benjamin_Bradt

_MahoraPress has set her status to "Off to edit Mahopedia"_

_ MahoraPress has left the chat session_

**Kugi-sama:** O_O

**Nurse_Izumi: **OxO

**Neko_Shiina: **OMGWTH

**Idol_Misa:** Meet me at the practice space. We have to conference.

* * *

As Hakase exited the main hall of Mahora Academy, she found her American friend waiting patiently for her, sitting on the stairway railing. She couldn't stop the rush of heat that came to her face as she blushed at his warm smile. "Wow . . . you actually came!"

"I said I would," he stood up and turned to walk beside her as she passed, "I told you that I'd let you have your fun if you let me crash in your dorm." Images of the morning started to rise to the surface but he quickly stomped them down, "I am nothing, if not a man of my word."

The scientist nudged him with her shoulder, "How lucky for me." An electric tingle shot through her as they touched, "I've got some great drills to run you through. Are you sure I'm not imposing?"

Ben smiled and flexed his mechanical hand, "Naw, this actually sounds like it might be fun. Besides," he glanced sideways as the pretty young girl, "saves me the trouble of trying to come up with an excuse to hang out."


	6. The Lab, Library Trio, and Limelight

The interior of the testing facility was comparable to a bomb shelter, in appearance and design; built to withstand the rigors of heavy weapons testing, the heat and force of experimental propulsion systems, and the threat of rogue robot aggression, the facility's test bunker was easily four football fields wide, six football fields long, and completely encased with reinforced concrete and tungsten carbide steel.

Ben whistled appreciatively, "You could, literally, detonate a hydrogen bomb in here and contain it."

Leaning out from the back of the device she was working on, Hakase smiled, "Back in the seventies, Japan did its first real alternative power source tests in here. There were a lot of explosions, and this building had to be rebuilt a few times. Eventually, they found a way to make it work." The small scientist climbed down from her massive machine, slamming the access panel, which set the machine to life. It unfurled its arms, massive hands large enough to grasp a full-grown man from neck to toes. A tank from the waist down, the upper torso was fearsome, with a pair of powerful arms, and a massive head with beady eyes and a gun mounted in its forehead. "Are you sure you want to run tests against a Battle Droid?"

Ben smiled, "Oh yeah, no doubt." After studying the idling robot for a few minutes, he turned and regarded Satomi with no small amount of respect. "This is amazing, I'm impressed. You're quite the genius, Hakase."

The heat of her blush was enough to fog her glasses. "N-no, it's really not that impressive." She turned her back to him as she polished the lenses clear, "They were built for last year's School Festival, 'Wizards vs Martian Robots', an epic battle that covered the entire campus." She turned around after regaining her composure, "Chao and I had fitted the robot army with defabricating lasers that would blast the clothes off of anyone unlucky enough to get in their way, disqualifying them from the game."

_Defabricating lasers?_ The implications alone were enough to drive Ben 's mind into his shoes; the sudden cascade of images that sprang, unbidden, into his mind forced him to blush so darkly he almost turned purple. Had this been an anime, he would have erupted in a nose bleed that would put Karin Maaka to shame. "D-d-d-defabricating . . . lasers; as in t-to de-fabricate the target's, uh . . . fabrics? MY fabrics?"

She realized the double entendre of her statement just shortly after he did, responding to his embarrassment with vehement denial and the defensive raising of her hands in a chaotic flailing, "NO! No, n-n-no no no, no, it isn't like that! I removed the defabricating weaponry after the festival! I'm not trying to, to . . . you know . . ."

They both lapsed into an awkward silence, looking away from each other.

Several yards away, secreted within one of the bunker's many observation rooms, The Library Trio watched the exchange with varying degrees of voyeuristic demeanor; Nodoka was the epitome of modesty, her face a torrid pink as she struggled to look away from them, but couldn't resist looking back up to see what was going on. Yue, too, was guilty of the same, though she hid her discomfort beneath a guise of disinterested boredom. "Haruna, can we go?" The small woman idly sipped at her juice box, shifting from foot to foot in an attempt to ignore her desire to watch the spectacle. "I think this is hardly anything of what you want it to be."

"Are you kidding me?" Haruna was riveted by sheer delight, occasionally cackling with amusement at their fumbling social exchanges as she furiously scribbled notes in her notebook, "This is exactly what I thought it would be; a pair of star-crossed lovers, sneaking away to someplace quiet and alone-"

"But for the perverted manga-ka and her unwilling accomplices," Yue chimed in. Nodoka could only squeak out a small sound of acknowledgement.

"I wouldn't need to drag you two down here if you could face up to your feelings," Paru did not look up from her notes as the icy comment slashed through Yue's defenses. She fell silent, "That's what I thought."

The awkward silence was shattered when Nodoka pressed a fist to her mouth, her voice a strangled squeak. "H-h-he's taking his shirt off!"

THAT got their attention. Throwing her notepad onto the nearby table, she nearly hurdled Nodoka to get a good view of the two teenagers in the bunker's interior. Even Yue found herself rushing up to see what they were doing; as for why, she couldn't bring herself to admit. "Ooh, he's forward, Paru likes." She grinned wickedly.

The slender scientist could not force words out of her throat as Ben patiently unbuttoned his shirt, nimble fingers deftly manipulating the plastic circles. The fine fabric came away, exposing his undershirt, sloped against a chest taut with natural muscle; not the kind of build one gets from diligent working out, but rather, the smooth shape of a lean body with little fat to be found. The tank top concealed the majority of the scars he'd acquired from the surgeries, but a few still protruded, most notably his heart surgery scar, an angry line between his pectorals. Being partially clothed helped his self-consciousness, but it could only go so far. Ben crossed his arms defensively, "Satomi-san, please . . . you're staring . . ."

Hakase responded by walking up to him, relieving him of his unbuttoned shirt, and taking his metal prosthetic in both hands, "This is beautiful. It's so smooth, lifelike actually." She examined it with an artist's eye, "I don't understand why you hide yourself so much, Ben, you're really amazing."

"You're pretty amazing yourself, Satomi." Ben smiled and gently brushed her hand with the fingers from his organic hand, before disengaging himself from her and walking across the space from the robot.

All three of the library trio sat perched behind the bunker glass, watching the exchange between the American and Mahora's resident genius with shameless interest. "Ooh my, ooh my," Paru was nearly panting with excitement, "I hope you two are paying attention."

"You're shameless." Regardless, Yue remained riveted to the spectacle.

"Look at him strip down for her!" Paru's eyes gleamed, "Salacious."

"Has anyone else noticed that his arm is made of metal?" Nodoka's muffled statement was issued from behind her hands.

Disappearing in a flash of red light, Ben narrowly avoided the robot's descending fist as it smashed into the concrete floor, spraying small chips of debris, the composite stone fracturing under the assault. The red-haired American appeared on its shoulder a second later, delivering a blast from the cannon on his right arm to the shoulder joint, removing the construct's massive shoulder plate and sending the steel flying across the hangar's interior. As it flailed up to grab him he disappeared again, announcing his new location with the muffled 'foomp' of weapon fire, smoke belching up from a small hole in the robot's flank.

Focused on the lightning quick movements on her remote monitor as she watched the cyborg quickly cycling between weapon commands, Hakase was not aware of the library trio as they approached, their eyes locked on the David & Goliath-esque conflict before them. The silence was broken shortly after, when Paru slapped the slender scientist on the back, causing Satomi to yelp in surprise as she jumped.

"Oh my God, I can't believe your boyfriend is a robot! Did you build him yourself? He's so much more human-looking than Chachamaru." Haruna raised a suggestive eyebrow, "Just how human-looking IS he? Come on, you can tell Paru-sama."

Hakase immediately turned beet red, "WHAT? OH GOODNESS NO! SAOTOME-SAN, NO!" She waved her arms in an embarrassed flurry, "Ben, I mean Bradt-sama, isn't a robot. He isn't my boyfriend either, you have this all wrong!"

Yue noisily sipped her box of Squid Cola, "I heard Negi-sensei talking earlier. You two are staying together?" Gasoline had been thrown on the fire.

Followed by a string of curse words, Ben came skidding across the concrete, stopping a few feet past the group of teenagers. He climbed to his feet slowly, "That thing learns way too fast. Satomi, you are much too good at building things to kick . . . my . . ." he noticed the others present, his words trailing off as he self-consciously turned his metal arm away from them. "I . . . uhh . . . didn't know we had company."

"Bradt-sama, I'm sorry," Hakase bowed apologetically, "Some of my classmates decided to come and poke their noses where they don't belong." The last few words were spoken through gritted teeth, her voice somewhat darkened by annoyance.

If she noticed her classmate's irritated tone, she didn't show it. Haruna walked up to Ben and smiled, thrusting a hand forward, "I am the Great Paru-sama, and these are my two trainees, Yue and-"

"FIST!" Nodoka, seeing the robot draw back another massive punch, squeaked out a warning cry as the attack came streaking toward the unaware Haruna and the American boy.

From the corner of Hakase's eye, she saw a command edit screen pop up on the remote display:

-SIM, open and insert the following edits to the command structure.  
-** OPEN  
-** find value 40 modify value 220  
- delete element type-less insert value element break-type  
remove attack-hex surge 3 insert defense-hex mettaur value 999 hitmax  
saveas edit fix directory BTC filename insert registry hash value 6E:27:DE:F5:ZZ  
** SAVED**

The whole exchange took less than a second; were it not for her genius intellect, she may not have even been able to register what had been written.

"ShieldPunch execute!" Body on autopilot, Ben grabbed Haruna around the waist and moved her behind him as he brought up his mechanical arm. The prosthetic shifted, redundant plates of dense metal spreading across the surface of the arm, creating upraised studs and thickening the digits to overblown proportions, until it seemed that the arm of something much larger than himself had been grafted to him. The robot's fist slammed into a bubble of blue energy that erupted around them both, crackles of energy skittering across the field's surface. He drew back his prosthetic and slammed it into the robot's fist, sending a shockwave up the machine's telescoped arm. The hangar echoed with loud snaps and pings as small parts within the robot's arm failed; screws and bolts splintered, seals crackled, pins and rods broke and buckled under the strain, and with a tired groan the limb collapsed apart. Exhaling a long sigh of relief, Ben looked at Paru, "You okay?"

Eyes as big as saucers, the manga-ka could only nod. What had just happened was the most terrifying and exhilarating experience of her life. "Good," Ben released her and started toward the robot, "Now please excuse me; I have a robot to maim." For a few seconds his head seemed to swim, and starbursts filled his vision. He blinked them away, trying to conceal the sudden rush of weariness.

-SIM, system status.  
-**LIFE SUPPORT AT 85% SYSTEMS POWER AT 45%**  
**-**SIM, how long will it take for the power levels to climb to maximum?  
-**WITH ABSTENANCE FROM ALL COMBAT PROTOCOLS, 600 SECONDS  
**-No, that will take too long. I don't know if I can keep up ten minutes without weapon protocols. Advise.  
-** POSSESSES ADEQUATE ATTACK VALUE TO RENDER THE TARGET NON-FUNCTIONAL  
**-Yeah, as well as compromise the building's structural integrity. It will bring down half the bunker on our heads; no, I need something more controlled.

"Execute." Vanishing as the robot's remaining arm struck the concrete where he was standing an instant before, he appeared behind it, standing on the center of its tank-like base. "Cross Blade, execute." A length of gleaming energy exploded forth from his hand, a blade made of pure light, and as the robot's torso swiveled to face him he rammed the weapon into its body. The machine's own momentum was its undoing; unable to stop the rotation, the mechanism literally garroted itself, sucking Ben's energy blade deep into the body as it raked vital cables and machinery across the deadly plasma edge. Within seconds, the device's core systems were ruined. The machine shuddered and belched smoke from the holes in its chassis, grinding to a halt as the light died in its eyes.

"Oh my God that was so cool!" Haruna was nearly jumping for joy, "I am SO going to have a story arc where Magical Girl has a romantic fling with a mechanical man!"

"Ow," Ben flexed his mechanical arm slowly, the joints throbbing, "I don't think I've ever really felt pain through this arm before."

Satomi was there in an instant, "Pain? Are you hurt?" She whirled to face Haruna, her cheeks red, "He _HURT_ himself, defending _YOU_! You had no business being here!"

"Satomi, it's okay." Ben laid a hand on her shoulder, "I expended a lot of energy when I wrote the shield program on the fly, fried a few nerve clusters in the arm, they'll repair. It's nothing to get angry at them about."

"You wouldn't have had to write the shield program if Haruna hadn't jumped in and distracted you!"

"Maybe, or maybe I would have had to anyway. That robot was much tougher than I gave you credit for." Ben shook his head at her, "It doesn't matter; everyone's safe, the robot's disabled." He winced again, noting the numerous scrapes and cuts he had accrued in the fight. "I'm going to go for a walk while you process your data, clear my head."

"I could go with you." Hakase smiled warmly.

"We all could," Haruna smirked devilishly, "I have more questions."

"I'm sure you do, but I need to take a walk and blow off some steam," Ben gestured to the numerous small wounds on his body, "Let these heal, etcetera." He took his shirt from Hakase and kissed her cheek, "Let's get some food later, talk about your findings."

"O-okay." Satomi smiled, "I'll see you later."

"Execute." Ben started walking away, and as Haruna moved to catch up with him, he vanished in a flash of red.

Across campus, Ben sat down at an open table on the promenade at Sweet Cat Teas, one of the bistros in the shopping quarter, looking at a drink menu. Having donned his shirt in the shadows of an alleyway a few blocks down, he had decided a drink and a few minutes to catch his break alone was what he needed. SIM had informed him that his wounds were nearly healed and that his power stores were swiftly replenishing, all that was needed was a few minutes of composure-restoring calm.

"Can I help you?" The waitress, a black-haired college student, smiled as she held her pen and pad poised for action.

"Yes, I'd like a cup of Assam, with a lemon wedge." The woman nodded and left. He sighed and closed his eyes, laying his menu down as he exhaled a long breath. When he opened his eyes, he saw that the other four seats at the bistro table were occupied by four teenage girls, each of them staring excitedly at him, their mouths an assortment of grins. "Uh . . . did I totally ignore the lot of you and sit down at your table?"

"Nope," the blonde one smiled and pulled her cellphone out, "We've been looking for you." She flipped the screen open, showing him that her wallpaper was a picture of him, on stage in the practice hall, rocking out with a stranger's guitar.

He face-palmed, "Shit, I am so sorry. I didn't even think about it at the time, but messing with your stuff was a total dick move on my part." He reached for his wallet, "If I broke it or anything, I'll pay for the repairs. Hell, I'll buy you a new one."

The purple-haired girl leapt up and grabbed his prosthetic hand by the wrist, shaking a disparaging finger. Her teeth gleamed in a fierce grin that made him nervous. "Oh no you don't! My name is Kugimiya Madoka, and nobody who touches my guitar gets off that easy. I demand satisfaction." As the other three rose from their seats, grinning at him, he began to wonder how the young Professor Springfield managed to survive even a day in this den of lionesses.


	7. Dekopin Rocket

"Now wait, please…" Ignoring their captive, the four girls led Ben across the campus, one on each arm, one pushing his back, the fourth, Madoka, led the group with a triumphant smile. The trip through town had been far from subtle, with the girls periodically laughing at his discomfort. The people they passed all stared after them, murmuring their suspicions as to why the girls were dragging the red-faced American through Mahora. "Can't we talk about this? I haven't even the slightest of ideas what this has turned into. I'm sorry I played your guitar, Kugimiya-san. What more do you want?"

"The time for apologies has passed, Mister Bradt." She shoved the auditorium doors open, each one striking the wall with a loud 'boom'. She led the group indoors, "I saw your performance, and I demand my own." She hopped up onto the stage, retrieving her guitar.

The girls were giggling and cheering as they pushed him up onto the raised platform. "I'm sorry; you want your own what?"

"My own performance," She shoved the guitar into his hand and leapt off the stage. "You don't get to wail on my guitar without showing me how good you are." As he turned to face them, he found them cheering and bouncing around in excitement. "So come on, American, show us what you can do!" The other girls echoed with shouts of encouragement.

"Come on, make some noise!"

"Show us what you got!"

He started to strum the guitar, noodling with the strings. It took him less time to get the feel of the instrument in his hands, playing something along the lines of Eric Clapton. The apprehension stared to melt as he felt the music wash over him. He was actually doing a pretty good j-.

"Oh come on!" Madoka heckled him, "Give us something with some energy!" The shout threw him off, his fingers fumbling on the strings.

"Yeah," Misa added, "I want something with a little more energy."

He mentally forced himself to focus, his fingers strumming the strings with more speed, more energy. He began to pick out 'In the Hall of the Mountain King', letting his fingers move with quickening precision. The son-"

"Come on, you can do better!" Ako shouted next, the others joining in on the heckling. He fumbled the strings again.

He was starting into the third song when Madoka shouted again, the strings shrieking in protest at the sour notes. He glared up at them angrily, and suddenly, it occurred to him that they were baiting him. From the way they grinned harder at his frustration, he could tell that they were trying to shake him up.

Well, two could play that. "Okay, you want harder?" He opened the emblem on his wrist and fished out the patch cable, plugging it into the guitar.

-SIM, engage Acoustic Interface.  
-**QUERY.  
-**What is it?  
**-ACCOUSTIC INTERFACE IS A FRIVOLOUS PROGRAM WITHOUT TACTICAL MERIT. WHY DO YOU WISH TO WASTE SPACE AND SYSTEM RESOURCES ON IT?  
**-Because not everything I do needs to be tactically motivated. I deserve to live the life I can, with the tools I possess. Now, engage the acoustic interface.  
**-ACOUSTIC INTERFACE ENGAGED**

As he raked his fingers across the strings, the electrified sound tore through the auditorium; his audience's mouths snapped shut with an audible 'pop'. The rising waves of Spoken's September made the air around him surge and writhe like water. As the other instruments joined the sounds and churned around in the open air, he chuckled in satisfaction at the group of dumbstruck girls.

_Years ago . . .  
A future was laid before me, and I  
took the task, and ran with it  
as far as I could go.  
I always wanted to be  
a part of something like this.  
You believed in me, and it's all I needed.  
Before I go, please know that I love you  
with all of my heart.  
My heart, my heart, is beating for you.  
I want you to know,  
that I'll be thinking of you,  
wherever I go._

The music drained down into a ghostly echo as the silence returned. He smiled, "What next?"

His words were like fire to their fuel. The girls erupted into a flurry of excited movements and sounds. Misa was the first to respond. "Something rock and roll, something to dance to." He smiled and launched into the opening chords of Falling Up's Goodnight Gravity. He bobbed his head along as he stepped up onto the edge of the stage,

_Static night, I'll be leaving soon;  
it won't be long. No, it won't be long,  
cause I'm wearing out under nowhere's moon.  
It won't be long, no it won't be long  
until I see the sun splash up the night sky  
and call it out to turn the planet new.  
So, goodnight gravity;  
it has kept me down,  
but I always get just one more try.  
I always get just one more try.  
So, goodnight gravity;  
it has kept me down,  
but I always get just one more try.  
I always get just one more try._

Shiina was snapping pictures of him with her cellphone, so he hopped down and approached her, his fingers beginning to strum the slow lead in to Alex Max' song, Tonight. As she looked up, she found his eyes locked on hers.

_Where the sky broke in two  
I found you dancing, alone;  
then, the room filled up with you  
and that song we both know._

The pretty blond froze as a deep scarlet spread across her cheeks. Ben smirked teasingly as he began to move around her, singing as if the song was meant for her. The other girls catcalled and whistled at their band mate, who couldn't stop nervously giggling.

_That's when you caught me with your eyes,  
sending shivers down my spine.  
And then you whispered in my ear,  
you said "I can feel it too."  
And then, you pulled me into you._

_Tonight,  
I've got you where I want you;  
closer, I can tell you anything.  
You're the song that I sing.  
Tonight, let the music take us over.  
We'll fall into forever.  
All is right,  
cause I've got you where I want you  
tonight._

As he brought the song to an end, Sakurako squealed in an explosion of giddy teenage girl energy, releasing all that had built up while she'd been frozen by his song. He turned toward Ako, "So, I guess it's your turn. What was your name?"

The wallflower threw her hands up in protest. "Oh no, NO, nonononono. You don't need to sing, no, not for me no. Nope."

The other girls descended on her like hungry predators, preventing her from fleeing to the auditorium doors. "Her name is Ako Izumi," Madoka laughed, "She likes to hide in the background if you don't make her come forward."

"I can relate," Ben began to strum the guitar again, the strains of December in Red's _Both Arms_ began to build around them. "Ako, what do you say we both make that leap away from the wall, together?"

Several songs later, the group emerged from the area that served as their practice space. "I hope you'll consider our offer." Madoka smiled and bowed, the other girls nodding in unison.

"Wow," Ben chuckled, a slight blush in his face, "You've given me something to consider, I'll give you that." He smiled and waved as he walked away, the girls' cheerful words echoing out in the stillness as they went their separate ways. The excitement of the last hour, playing music with the girls and embracing the normality that he'd been denying, was like a chemical high. He felt like he was floating.

"You've certainly become popular, Mister Bradt." The liquid calm voice made him jump. Ben spun to face the speaker, recognizing the tall, slender form of the ninja girl from the rooftop chase. "Considering your somewhat standoffish demeanor, last we met, this is a considerable shift in alignment."

He smiled at the pretty girl, "When you've been through the things I have, it's easy to become blinded by pessimism. Everyone's been so nice; it'd be poor manners on my behalf if I didn't play the part of a gracious guest."

Peering at him through lazy cat-like eyes, Kaede crooked an eyebrow. "That sounds more like the man that outmaneuvered me on that rooftop, keeping himself guarded against the threat of showing human weakness."

"To be fair, I didn't outmaneuver you. You outmaneuvered me, I got distracted and fell off the roof. As for being human, when you have as much metal and silicon in you as I do, the concept of humanity seems elusive." Ben's smile faded, "But I digress. Let's dispense with the cryptic, contentious dialogue."

Kaede faltered, "Contentious? Not a word I know. I'm sorry, my English is-"

Ben sighed, "Combative, challenging." He knew there'd have to be someone whose toes he stepped on, some reason that this whole normal life thing wasn't going to work. "What's your problem with me?"

To his surprise, Kaede's expression changed to one of concern, "Problem? I think you misunderstand me. I apologize, my English is not as good as some of the others. I am pleased to see how well you're getting along with everyone, especially since you seemed so uncomfortable with their presences when you first arrived."

Ben blushed slightly, "I'm sorry, too. I guess this," he gestured around himself, "is a little overwhelming. It wasn't long ago I had begun to accept that my life was going to be a very shallow circuit." He wavered for an instant, ultimately falling silent. He didn't want to go around rattling about battle, death, and rebirth in other . . . places, whatever this was compared to the Tennyson's California, or Dentech City in Japan, or the various other phantoms that tugged restlessly at his mind. He also didn't want to go on at length about living a normal life in Mahora and the country beyond; last thing he wanted to do was romanticize himself as some sort of warrior drifting from place to place, or some sort of tragic lone cowboy.

"Well, then I am glad we managed to resolve this miscommunication." Kaede smiled and assumed a combat pose, "Now, we can spar without awkwardness."

"Say what now?" Ben was confused, "Did you say we were fighting?"

"I came here to meet the one who evaded me on the rooftop, so I could ultimately test his skill." Kaede's cat-like smile did not waver, "So come on, let us begin our spar."

"Absolutely not," Ben shook his head, "You can't be ser-"

Disappearing for an instant, Kaede cut him off in mid-sentence as her foot struck him in the center of his chest. Ben was knocked off his feet and flew, skidding to a stop several feet away. He had managed to get his metal arm into shield position before the blow landed, but it did nothing to deflect the sheer impact force of her powerful move. "It would be in your best interest to take this seriously, Mister Bradt." Kaede resumed her combat position. "As ninja sensei to our young professor, it is my responsibility to make sure that Negi-bozu knows how to overcome any opponent. And as I have never faced an opponent possessing your ability to simply vanish into the air, appearing somewhere else seconds later, I must find your weakness and defeat you."

Ben stepped backward, "You're absolutely crazy."

"Love makes us do crazy things." She winked at him, then launched into her attack.


	8. Ninjagaimasu!

**COMBAT MODE INITIATED  
HUD SET TO TRACKING MODE  
WEAPON PROGRAMS SET TO OCCULAR SELECTION**

With a feral yell, Kaede sprang, her foot slashing downward in an axe kick that seemed to cut the air itself. Ben threw himself out of the way, rolling to the side as her heel split the concrete where he had been standing an instant before. "I don't want to fight you, Kaede." He said as he climbed to his feet, "I'm not going to and you can't make me."

"Then stand still," Kaede smirked, "I'll make this quick."

The woman blurred and seemed to elongate as she moved, faster than his eye could follow, but not so fast that the 'Heads Up Display' couldn't track her movements. He was aware of her coming in on his left side a few seconds before she was there, so that as she slipped in to attack, he caught her in an arm bar and spun her around, binding her arms up with his as he pinned her back against his chest. Unable to gain leverage with her arms, she could not struggle herself free. "You can't leverage yourself in this position."

She tried to lash out with one of her legs, but he snaked his around the joint of her knee, immobilizing it. "Interesting technique; an opponent could effectively dislocate both my arms and my knee from here."

"Maybe, but it isn't my way." He did not let her go, "I don't want to fight you, and I am not going to let you go until you stop trying to make me." He shifted the way his weight sat on his unbound leg, effectively balancing them both on it.

She turned her head enough to look at him through one lazy eye, "So you're going to stand here and hold me all night?"

Feeling awkward from her phrasing, he coughed. "I-If that's what it takes."

Kaede relaxed herself, rigid muscles becoming soft. Her body leaned back into the curve of his chest, pressing herself against him in a sensual way. She twined her free leg around his, "Then let's get comfortable." Without his leg free, the pair fell backwards, landing with a dull thud on the cobblestone street. Sandwiched between the smooth stone surface of the hillside street at his back and the warm supple curves of the voluptuous ninja pressed into his front, he quickly developed a raddish-hued blush that made his face feel aflame. He attempted to say something, but all that issued from his mouth was a short burst of sound, his voice cracking. If Kaede noticed or shared his discomfort, she didn't show it; if anything, she readjusted herself into a better position. "Ah, much nicer." She chuckled in a husky tone, "You're quite comfortable, Mister Bradt."

That was all it took for the American to lose his composure. Ben flailed, releasing his hold on her. She responded by moving to her feet with a kip up and following it with a kick to the ribs that lifted Ben off the street and sent him tumbling along the incline in a drunken cartwheel-like motion. He rolled down the steep hill, coming to a rest at the bottom, groaning.

**LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS AT 25%**

His tattered shirt hung from him, the sheen of his metal prosthetic gleaming in the glow of the nitrogen streetlamps. He slowly climbed to one knee, noticing another gleam; apparently his slacks had suffered in the roll as well, as his metal leg was also quite visible. He looked up from his crouch, eyes fixed on the slim figure of the ninja as she descended the hill. Her feet made no sound on the stone street. "That . . ." he wheezed through clenched teeth, "was a dirty . . . trick . . . Kaede."

Her face still held the catlike expression of delight, although viewed from his knees it seemed less Garfield and more Cheshire, as if she were toying with a mouse. "A ninja must use all her weapons to conquer an opponent, and I am quite well armed." He caught a slight gleam of teeth in her smile. "You must understand, Mister Bradt, Professor Springfield is quite fond of you. He trusts you implicitly," the smile faded, replaced by a much sterner expression. "We have to make sure that you aren't a risk to Professor Negi, because he is very important to all of his students."

"So this is about Springfield, eh?" He pushed himself to his feet, "So, are all of you going to dig into my life, sneak up on me and try to kick my ass? If I lay down and let you beat on me, does that make it better for you?"

"I wish you would not take this so personally," Kaede frowned, "There has been much fighting and other forms of competition surrounding Professor Springfield since his arrival."

_Like the battling when I first arrived between Negi and the blonde girl._ Ben reminded himself. "Fine, you want a fight, I'll give you one." He tightened his fists, "But don't expect me to hold back."

"I would be insulted if you did."

Ben disappeared in a red flash, appearing immediately in front of the ninja; her hands dropped, catching his wrist as he swung down into her gut. She had been expecting the attack, but what she had not expected was the sudden 'whump' as the Air Cannon fired. The blast of force caught her full in the torso, hurling her up and backwards, throwing her onto a café rooftop. It took her a second to register what was happening, the shock of having the air driven from her lungs as he had, and her new position. As she clutched her stomach and rose, she found him standing on the rooftop across the alley from her. His right hand was only now reverting from its gun form, "Now we're even."

Kaede didn't say a word, she merely sprang from her crouch into an aerial roll. He had barely cleared his spot as her feet came down, shattering the roof tile where he'd been. She followed it with a scything sweep kick that brought down the café's rooftop air vent. Ben scrambled to his feet and took up defensive stance, "Now who's taking this too personally?"

"Hardly," Kaede squared off across from him, "I am merely doing as you are, choosing to not restrain my offensive capabilities." She murmured something under her breath, drawing the shadows around herself and forming a myriad of Kaede-clones, each wielding traditional ninja weapony.

"Oh," Ben swallowed thickly as his arm shifted into an imposing sword of energy, "Well . . . sucks to be me, then."

The clones moved as one, a spreading swarm of skilled warriors, nearly invisible for their speed and armed to the teeth. In a blink they were closing in from all sides, their faces a menacing smile delivered with cat-like eyes. He retracted the sword arm and drew himself in tight.

** EXECUTE**

Lightning exploded from Ben as the shadow clones closed in, connecting each of the phantoms with a shimmering tendril of electricity as they each exploded into a wisp of smoke, their weapons clattering to the rooftop. Kaede nodded approvingly from her position, having not moved after releasing her clones. "Well done, a very effective use of a short-ranged attack. Remind me to be cautious if you in prolonged brawling quarters."

** EXECUTE**

"If you like that, check this out." Ben thrust his hands forward, and as if a great wind had exploded from behind him, the scattered weapons shot from the ground toward Kaede. Her eyes flew open as she brought her hands up in defense, banishing the phantasm armaments. They evaporated into curls of smoke, revealing the shape of the American as he flew toward her, fist drawn back.

** EXECUTE **

She moved from his path as the metal hand expanded and grew, demolishing the aluminum air vent behind where she'd been. He barely turned to face her before she came at him, sword drawn.

** EXECUTE**

His hands blurred as she came into combat range. Sparks sprayed as blades clashed, whipping the air as they rained blows down on each other. Most of their attacks clanged off the other's weapon, but each one of them scored a blow from time to time, shredding cloth and drawing thin lines of red in their wake. They would hold against each other for a flurry of attacks, then break away, then attack each other ferociously again. This went on for several long minutes, until they broke away again, both of them sweat-flecked and breathing hard. Ben grabbed at the band of his trousers as they slipped, belt destroyed in the fight. "You give up yet?"

Kaede smirked, "Hardly, de gozaru." The ninja's clothing had received numerous cuts as well, hanging in ragged patches and strips.

"Those clothes aren't going to take much more," Ben remarked, tightening his grip on the waistline of his pants.

"Look at yours," she said without flinching, "You have to actually hold them up. I think that you are showing a marked tactical deficit. Clearly you are the more compromised member of this conflict."

"Not likely," Ben released his trousers' waist and took up a fighting stance, "You're just trying to buy some time to rest." Kaede took up her own stance, drawing her arms up to attack. There was a soft hiss as something tore, and the ninja fell out of shirt. Three things happened in quick succession:

The ninja girl yelped in surprise and rushed to cover herself.

The American turned a deep scarlet and averted his eyes.

Kaede used Ben's awkwardness as a distraction to quickly close the distance.

Ben never saw her coming; one minute she was blushing and trying to preserve some modesty, the next her foot was in his chest and he was sailing over the rooftop's edge. She rode him down to the street as if he were a skateboard, foot in his chest and arms crossed across her chest; the impact sounded deafening to him and he dizzily imagined that it shook the city for miles around. It certainly felt like it.

Kaede smiled down at him where he lay, under her feet. "Tactical deficit," she said smugly, "I guess this means I win."

"Fine, you win." He wheezed, "Now get off me and go put a shirt on, you weigh a ton."

The walk back to the dorms had been agony; twenty-two city blocks, seven thousand two-hundred and sixteen foot steps to the girl's dormitory, plus four flights of stairs to reach the third floor. Kaede had been nice enough to help him make his way to the dorms, what with the crippling damage to his prosthetic leg after she'd turned him into a human slalom off the top of a two story building, but the one-hundred and twenty stairs had been a challenge. Somewhere along the way he'd started counting footsteps, a symptom of his obsessive-compulsive disorder.

As a kid, it had been much worse; he would subconsciously count every group he'd find, be it food, toys, or whatever. Odd numbers of things would be visually offensive, and he could only eat things in even numbers. Part of autism was the tunnel vision-like focus that absorbs everything that stimulated his senses, something the doctors had informed his parents would be a life-long debilitation that prevented him from fitting into normal society. It was the first time someone had called him a freak, and he'd worked harder than he'd ever worked to overcome it. A stabled tendency for the most part, it would occasionally sneak up on him when he was severely exhausted, irritating him to no end. But now, he was thankful for it, because it gave him something to think about other than the still running list of system errors that SIM had been droning in a monotone voice for the better part of an hour.

"SIM," Ben wheezed as he emerged onto the third floor of the dormitory building, "Disengage all vocal accompaniments to system diagnostic reports."

**ACKNOWLEDGED.**

The voice vanished, but the list of issues continued to scroll down the left side of his peripheral vision. He sighed and crossed to Hakase's dorm room, knocking on the door. "Hakase, please open the door."

The professor opened her door with a dangerous scowl, "Do you know what time it is? You're four hours late." She cut off as she noticed his battered condition, "Oh sweet lord, get in here!" She helped him over to the spare bed, "My God, what happened to you?"

"Random encounter with a ninja."

"That doesn't make any sense!"

"That's what I told her, but she insisted." He blinked twice, "I'm sorry, I sound out of it, but I'm still fairly lucid. Promise." He smiled weakly.

Her heart fluttered, but the scientist inside stamped it down, choosing to focus on connecting him to her portable diagnostic machine. As the system log began bombarding her with a mile long list of damaged or unresponsive systems, she shook her head. "How you're still walking is a mystery to me, your systems are at less than five percent. You're in worse shape than when we met."

"But more dressed at least," he chuckled, looking down at the tattered remains of his clothes. "Sort of."

"Stop trying to joke around," her voice cracked with concern, "You're in a bad way. You need some serious maintenance before I can condone you going into downtime for regeneration."

"No down time, eh? That's unfortunate." He was lightly thumping the palm of his hand against his temple. Vision in his right eye kept getting garbled lines of text, something about approaching hostile. "Hostile what, exactly?"

"What?" Satomi looked at him, confused.

"I don't know," Ben whacked himself a few times, "I keep getting some kind of warning, something about a hostile something or other."

The door opened and Fei Ku entered, fresh from the baths and wearing a towel. "Ah, hot bath after long practice is much good."

Ben recognized her instantly, "Oh shit, _THAT_ hostile."

"Aru?" Ku recognized him as well, "Peeping tom, Master Ku will smash this time!"

"Ku, wait!" Hakase leapt up, but not fast enough.

The martial artist's foot shot past her, hitting Ben square in the chest. "Iron Foot Master, Fatality Move, Peeping Tom Smasher!"

The American was ejected out through the open window, sailing through the night air at the behest of gravity.

Sighing contentedly, Negi Springfield soaked in the solitude of the empty bath house. As much as he hated bathing, Asuna had been hammering the necessity of it into him since his arrival at Mahora; it also didn't hurt that, after a long practice session with Fei Ku, a hot soak was what the body really needed. "So peaceful…" The skylight imploded, causing Negi to scream and flail in a most excited fashion as the crumpled form of a teenage boy plunged through the reinforced glass and through it, hitting the bath water with a loud splash. "Oh my word!" Negi hustled over and dragged Ben's upper torso above the surface. "Ben, my goodness, what happened?"

Ben looked over at Negi, grinning drunkenly, "Oh, hi Negs! Just enjoying my evening const . . . constititit . . . constitutu . . ." he snorted, "That Chinese girl kicks REAL hard!"

Looking back up through the hole in the skylight, the small professor could see the form of two students looking out of a third story window in the girl's dormitory. "Wow, what's quite a drop."

"I know right?" Ben snickered, his eyes wandering around the room, slightly off sync with each other. "I think I've gotten my ass kicked, but it's offline, so I can't get a status update." Rolling in their sockets, his eyes finally crossed, and closed. He went slack.

Hearing the cacophony of what could only be the girls, quickly moving towards the bath where the crash had occurred. Negi realized that they both were about to have an exceptionally awkward evening. "Oh crum . . ." he moaned quietly to his unconscious friend.

**Author's Notes:** Okay, I'd been meaning to start this on all my stories, but I keep forgetting to. In a hope to enhance my reviews and reader hits, I'm going to start responding to my reviews and PMs from readers/. Of course, right now it says I only have 4 reviews, and I thought I had more. So, if I don't respond to you, nothing personal. I'll try to catch up in future chapters. ^_^

**Traingham:** I don't know if I ever said this, but wow, thanks so much for reading as far as you have. You're my favorite Negima FF author, so it's a huge honor to see your name on here.

**Luis Ortiz:** Glad you like the pairing. I wanted to make it about a pairing that wasn't written to death.

**Leo247:** Glad you're enjoying the story so much! I hope the sparring match between Kaede and Ben was as cool as you wanted it to be, it was a challenge to write. I'm not as good as I want to be with battle scenes; I didn't want Ben to win, that'd be terribly Mary Sue-ish of him, maybe get a few good hits but I still wanted Kaede to mop the floor with him. Also, I wanted to preserve a lot of the anime/manga feel to the battle scene.

To everyone who reviews, thanks for reading.

To everyone who reads, review!


	9. Finding Some Common Ground

". . . ain I w . . . to than . . . ou . . . same," the speaker's voice was spoken in a high-pitched british accent, clearly Professor Springfield. " . . . not sure h . . . conscio . . . this ti . . ."

"Yeah, yeah, I . . . out h . . . st time." The second speaker was new, obviously female, although the way she spoke to the young brit was decidedly lacking in respectful civility. "You owe . . . this, always dr . . . e weirdest sh . . . int . . . life was s . . . fore you came . . ."

**-SYSTEM ONLINE**

"Oh, _neat_, this is all terribly familiar." Ben slowly worked himself into a sitting position, checking to make sure he was dressed. "At least I got to keep my pants this time."

"Well thank God for that," the female speaker, a slim girl with large round glasses and her orange-brown hair drawn back in a long braid, "There's enough nudity following Negi around in the form of my classmates, I don't need naked foreign men as well." She sighed deeply and scowled at Negi, who was still blushing and flailing over her earlier comment about his nude student issue, "What are you still doing here, Springfield? Shouldn't you be off sleeping, or climbing into Kagurazaka's bunk?"

"Chisame, please!" Springfield implored her to cease her teasing, "I'll go in a minute, I swear, I just wanted to conduct a formal introduction between you both." He shook his head wearily, chuckling, "This has been an interesting night, eh my American friend?"

"Tragic understatement," Ben smirked.

"Anyway, this is one of my students, Chisame Hasegawa." He gestured to the girl beside him, whose gazed flickered between Ben and Negi as if they were both unwanted pests. "Chisame, this is Benjamin Bradt."

"Another wizard, huh?" Chisame asked flatly.

Negi floundered, "No, nonono, he's nothing like that."

The American chuckled, "Sounds like your big secret isn't as 'secret' as it ought to be."

"Tell me about it," Chisame and her homeroom teacher mumbled simultaneously.

"Well, you got to do your introduction." The girl was immediately shoving the young teacher toward her dormitory door, "Now get the hell out, if you want me to get enough sleep to be in class tomorrow." As he passed out the doorway, he tried to turn and say goodnight, but Chisame was already closing the door in his face. She sighed wearily and crossed the room, flopping down in her computer chair; she looked past the screen at Ben, lying on her couch across the room, "I've got work to do, so keep the noise down."

"No worries," Ben laid back down and rolled over, turning his back to her. "I'm going to get some rest, and tomorrow I'll make sure to find myself somewhere else to stay. I'd hate to be an inconvenience." Her reply came as a monosyllabic grunt as she returned to her screen, pounding away at the keyboard with a frenzy.

**-SIM, what is the current system time?  
-0100 HOURS**

Ben sighed and pinched the brow of his nose. He didn't want to be awake; considering the beating he'd soaked in the previous evening, he wanted nothing more than to sleep until the rise of a new day, one preferably without a violent encounter with a sexy ninja girl. But he was wide awake.

**-SIM, why am I awake?  
-SYSTEM HAS BEEN RESTORED TO 100% FUNCTIONALITY  
-But it's one o'clock in the morning.  
-SYSTEM HAS BEEN RESTORED TO 100% FUNCTIONALITY  
-ADDITIONAL SYSTEM DOWN TIME IS NOT PRODUCTIVE  
-How long was I out?  
-APPROXIMATELY 200 MINUTES  
-In the future, unless I give you a set time to boot my systems, you will let me wake up when I am damn good and ready. Understand?  
-ACKNOWLEDGED**

"Friggin' ridiculous," Ben grumbled as he sat up groggily, "Getting so a guy can't get more than a few hours of sleep after he gets his ass handed to him." His eyes adjusted to the darkness slowly, the moon pale silhouette of Chisame Hasegawa asleep at her computer desk. He rose and silently made his way over to her, eyes seeking the glowing computer monitor before her; DreamKnitter was open, the windows filled with strings of code and xhtml text, much of which had jagged red lines under or through it. Scattered around her on the table were a number of books about website hacking, how to prevent being hacked, and how to recover from the damage done by a hacker.

"So, website got hacked, eh?" He said quietly as he sat down beside the sleeping teenager, "Looks like some powershell fragmentation and code corruption, query malformations . . . wow." He whistled quietly, "All of this was hand-coded and without jovo-script, must have taken weeks to create. And probably about fifteen minutes to destroy. Gonna take at least a month to back check all this code." He looked over at the sleeping Chisame, her glasses lying nearby on a Photoshock handbook. "But I know a thing or two to make this smoother." Turning the second monitor slightly so that the darkness could more completely eclipse Hasegawa, Ben set to work.

"Chisame-chan, it is seven in the morning." A sweet, familiar voice called to her, "You'll be grumpy if you don't get a bath before school, and it really isn't fair to take it out on Professor Springfield." The exhausted school girl grumbled something unintelligible and vitriolic in reply, prompting a cry of alarm from the speaker. "Waah! It isn't fair to take it out on Chiu-tan either, pyon~!"

"PYON~?!" Chisame's eyes flew open as she bolted upright from her sleeping crouch.

On the monitor, her face screwed into an adorable pout, was Chisame; or rather, Chisame's net idol persona, Chiu. Dressed the bunny girl outfit she'd worn on her last webcast, the small figure smiled and waved at her. "Good morning, Chisame!"

"What . . .?" She fumbled for her glasses, "What the heck? Where . . .?"

"Your glasses are on the Photoshock book to your right." Chiu-tan said cheerfully. The small woman walked across the explorer bar on the bottom of the display and pointed them out.

"Uh . . . thank you . . ." She put the glasses on and examined the figure on her display more closely. "Amazing, you look exactly like her, I mean me. Wow, this is one crazy dream."

The dormitory door's knob turned with a click, swinging open as Ben entered the room. He had a drink carrier from the coffee shop across from the dorms in one hand, and Chisame's keys in the other. "Good morning Ms. Hasegawa, good morning Chiu-tan."

"Good morning Bradt-sama." The digital figure bowed respectfully.

Chisame stared at him, "What the hell is going on here?! You better have some damn good answers, or so help me I'll-"

"Just a second, please," Ben sat an espresso and a poppy seed muffin down in front of her, "You need coffee and breakfast." He sat down across from her and lifted the second cup from the tray, taking a sip of the hot coffee inside. "So, I saw that your site got hacked last night. Given your coding methodology, it would have taken you at least a month to back check all your scripting by hand, so I gave you some help."

"You did a month's worth of work in less than twelve hours," she said skeptically.

Ben nodded, "Yes. I created a query algorithm to isolate damaged sectors of script and determined the method of attack that was used on your site. Then, I built Chiu-tan and had her suss out the major breeches in code and re-assemble them using jovo-script and string coding."

"Chiu-tan?"

"Ohayo gosaimas, Chisame-chan, ogenki desuka?"" The digital girl waved animatedly.

"Chiu-tan is a NetNavi, a self-aware user interface. She interacts with the user via vocal input, perceives via peripheral monitoring devices, and serves as system protection for your computer and your website, once it's been reactivated."

"So you did a months worth of work, constructed an artificial intelligence to patrol my website against future hacking attempts." In the background of their conversation, Chiu-tan stepped behind a folding curtain and emerged a second later, dressed as a sexy police officer. "All in a single sitting."

"Yosh!" The tiny police woman shouted, twirling a pair of handcuffs around one finger.

"Actually I used your videos and images to create a composite persona that would respond to a various set of pre-programmed stimulus in a manner as dictated by your recorded performances, then composite and modify them as she was exposed to new experiences. For example," Ben moused over and began to rapidly click Chiu-tan's exposed belly, sending the tiny woman into a flurry of giggles.

"Noo~!" She protested breathlessly between peals of laughter, "Not fair, stop picking on mee~!"

"This is insane." Chisame took the mouse from Ben, proceeding to click Chiu-tan experimentally, prompting a wide array of squeals and protests.

"How can you be so off-guarded by this?"

"Normal people do not spontaneously generate artificial intelligence!"

"Your teacher is a wizard!" He said incredulously, taking a sip of his coffee. "Your class roster includes a vampire, a gynoid, a ghost, a time traveler, and a teenage girl who sits at the head of your school's Robotics and Aeronautics division. Your freaking school has a robotics and an aeronautics division! At what point is your life normal, in any way? Besides," he set the cup down and rolled up his sleeve, exposing the metallic sheen of his arm. "I am a cyborg, it's not like I am any semblance of normal myself."

Chisame scoffed, "I'm pretty normal."

"You live a double life as a net idol!" Ben sighed in frustration, "You don't like her? Fine." He pulled a USB cable out of his wrist port, "I'll download her off your system and find somewhere else for her to be." He plugged into her PC box, prompting a command window to open, streams of text running past. "I'm running the compression algorithm now, so give me a minute to compress her program for safe storage."

Chiu-tan bowed apologetically, "I'm sorry to have inconvenienced you." The girl smiled, but her large brown eyes were very sad.

"Alright, that's enough." Chisame crossed her arms and sat back against the futon, looking away from her digital avatar, ". . . I never said she couldn't stay."

Chiu-tan looked up hopefully, "Y-you mean I can stay?"

Chisame glanced at her, jerking in surprise at the enormity of the moe factor her tiny self possessed, "Yes, yes, you can stay. Just, tone down the madcap, alright?"

Chiu-tan wiped a tear from one eyes and nodded, "Yes ma'am."

"And as for you, Mr. Bradt, was it?" Chisame rose and stretched, her night shirt pulling up enough to unintentionally reveal a flash of taut belly.

"Ben is fine." He looked away, his cheeks reddening slightly.

"Mr. Bradt." Noticing his response, Chisame hurriedly jerked her shirt back down, reddening a little herself, though she concealed it behind her tsundere façade. "As payment for sleeping here last night, I expect to come back and find my website online. And then, we need to talk about how to get vengeance on the bastard responsible."

Ben crooked an eyebrow, "As you wish, master." As Chisame grabbed her towel and left for the bath house, she heard Ben say as he returned to the computer. "Come on Chiu-tan, we have work to do."

"Yosh!"


End file.
